First thing Wednesday, 2.8.06

Richard Katz reportedly doesn't get the MWD gig, friends of Cesar Chavez turn their legal guns on Marc Cooper, everybody it seems is investigating the SEIU's outpouring for Martin Ludlow, Britney Spears gets a visit from the law...plus a crackdown on tattoos and navels, a new date for the QM2 and would you believe 27 million blogs? Those and more after the jump.

♦ Richard Katz was passed over for the MWD top job, the Times says in a two-paragraph brief citing sources saying the water agency offered the job to its general counsel, Jeffrey Kightlinger. The LA Weekly's Judith Lewis had joined the Antonio-Cadiz watch.

♦ Bill Bradley reports at New West Notes that the UFW has demanded a retraction from the LA Weekly for claims Marc Cooper made in a column that ran after the Times series on the farmworkers union. I hear Cooper has penned a column in response that might appear in this week's paper, lawyers willing.

♦ Who wants to know whether SEIU Local 99 illegally funded Martin Ludlow's run for the city council? Only the the U.S. Attorney, the DA and the Ethics Commission.

♦ Mayor Villaraigosa called for a change in management at the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority.

♦ The sheriff's department in Malibu paid a call on Britney Spears after she was photographed driving with her baby in her lap, rather than in a car seat in the back as the law (and common sense) requires.

♦ San Bernardino County employees have been told they no longer can look, well, normal.

♦ The Queen Mary II's arrival at the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach was put off a day, to Feb. 23. Apparently the plan is for the cruise ship to sail through the Long Beach outer harbor, salute the original Queen Mary, then dock over on the L.A. side. Long Beach has a website up for the occasion.

♦ Technorati's latest "State of the Blogosphere" says there are now 27 million blogs out there, with about 27,000 new ones a day plugging in to the net. There is also a record amount of blog spamming: Technorati guesses that 60% of the daily pings it receives are spam generated.

♦ Curiously for a person of academic stature, the New York Times just today runs an obit on UCLA linguist Peter Ladefoged. Heck, even LA Observed had the news back on Jan. 27.